Notes for Expats on Scottish bands touring internationally and features on Scottish music, sport, film and the life written by and for Scots around the world. More →
You need a degree in accountancy to be a Rangers fan these days. On Tuesday, the Daily Record broke the story that Rangers’ owner Craig Whyte sold four years’ worth of Rangers season ticket sales to fund his takeover of the Govan club. Later that same day, Whyte released a statement admitting the deal happened [...]
Across the world, there are people who specialise in getting what they want by any means necessary. In Japan, they have the Yakuza; in Hong Kong, the Triads; in Italy (and Little Italy), the Mafia. Maybe we should add the Scottish Football Association to that list.
This week, while the First Minister set a start date for Scotland’s divorce from England – 2014, if Alba says aye – the Chief Operating Officer of Rangers has proposed a new marriage between the Auld Enemies: a merger of the Scottish and English League Cup tournaments into a British League Cup. Ali Russell suggests that the [...]
No-one predicted 2012 would be the best year for Scottish football in decades, and looking back, it’s still hard to believe what just happened. Motherwell’s amazing form from mid-January to May pushed the Old Firm until the last day of the season; three teams are in Europe past Xmas; and the national team sit clear [...]
Millions of kids all over the world opened their Santa stockings on Sunday morning to find football gifts of joy: Leo Messi’s garish yellow boots, FIFA ’12 for the X-Box, a new Dundee top. Me, my Xmas football gift came a few days early this year, and the Santa wasn’t a fat man with a [...]
The Scottish Premier League’s rule change to allow the re-introduction of terracing at football grounds is just the first in a series of announcements to be made under a “Back to the Eighties” initiative to reinvigorate, revitalise, and revivify top-tier Scottish club football. Over the next 18 months, soccer casuals, football specials, and genuine competition [...]
Having read that the new Scotland kit was launched with “augmented reality,” I was hopeful that we’d be augmenting the new kit’s reality with a better football team. Alas, we’re stuck with Gary Caldwell for the time being – the reality augmentation for this kit’s launch was a clever video installation in Glasgow’s Buchanan Galleries [...]
Last week, Sky and ESPN extended their current deal for TV coverage of Scottish Premier League matches for the next five-and-a-half seasons, and at a higher price: £16m per season, 25% above the current rate. The Scottish Premier League’s chief executive, Neil Doncaster, hailed the package as “excellent news” for Scottish football clubs. I disagree.
David Beckham is in line for a shock move to Scottish football. The 36-year-old LA Galaxy star has been coy about his next step now his five-year stint in America’s Major League Soccer has ended with victory in the 2011 MLS Cup, but I can exclusively reveal he is negotiating with Stewart Milne, Aberdeen FC’s [...]
